Work on Next Zelda (apparantly; not confirmed) has Already Begun

[vanguard333]

According to a few sources on the internet, apparently Eiji Aonuma commented in a new Breath of the Wild book that work on the next game has already begun.

This could be incorrect, and, even if it is, he might be referring to a spin-off, and I will update this if anything confirms or says otherwise about this. But, in case it's true, and he's referring to the next main series Zelda game, what would you like to see in the next game?

I, personally, would like for them to keep the same open world design, but go in the opposite direction of the theme (or is atmosphere the better word), Breath of the Wild: I'm hoping to see a thriving Hyrule Castle Town that, to scale, is the size of a medieval city. I want to see more towns and villages, and for them to be more elaborate. I would like to see a full-size intact Lon-Lon Ranch. I would like to see more dungeons, and for them to be temples and fortresses, rather than robotic animals. Speaking for fortresses; in keeping with this theme, rather than having ruins and bokoblin treeforts everywhere, I would like to see fortresses, watchtowers, and such scattered throughout Hyrule; many of which are occupied by minions of Ganon, and maybe even have an intact Hyrule Castle that's fully explorable, as well as the return of Ganon's Tower.

Speaking of which, since (sentence continues in the spoiler below)

Spoiler

In Breath of the Wild, Ganon went completely bestial for the whole game, for the new game, in keeping with the change in theme I'm suggesting, perhaps Ganon could be Ganondorf for the whole game.

Also, I really liked in Breath of the Wild that enemies like Hinox and Lynels were in a 3D Zelda game. But, I found myself missing armoured enemies like Darknuts and Iron Knuckles. It would be cool to see them return for this game, as well as armoured variants of ordinary enemies, such that standard attacks will not hurt them one bit. Maybe even an armoured Lynel?

Also: I would like to see spears deal greater damage, and two-handed weapons to be a little faster.

[Johann]

Generally, as soon as a game in as big of a series as Zelda or Mario is finished, they tend to go right into the planning of the next one. Especially after BotW's success, it's no surprise that they'd begin planning on the next one after the content (including the DLC) is finished and ready to go.

I'm hoping that the next game mirrors the path they took when creating Majora's Mask; simply re-use most of the game's assets (models, physics, etc), which would cut down development time drastically (developing the physics took up a large portion of it).

[Magical Glace]

Unsurprising, really.  

My main hope is that they improve the dungeons, the Divine Beasts felt... really small and cramped, especially since there were only 4.  

Also hoping the menus are less of a hassle than BotW's.  BotW menus took forever.

[Gebby]

The main thing that kept me from playing BOTW for more than an hour, besides shitty mechanics, was the world being so damn boring. If they made it more lively, that'd be fantastic. Also, please no more technology.

Besides that, I hope they change some of the bullshit about BOTW. Replacing traditional items with 'runes' or whatever was dumb. Stamina was ridiculous. Lightning striking your metalic items...why the fuck?

[TheKingOfTheDragovians]

What I think they'd need to do. I'd like a more narrative driven game that aids itself to exploration. Weapon durability, I liked it well enough in, but they should go with a method that makes your weapons a little more personal, longer weapon durability, repair options for broken weapons. More playstyles and combat options, quests to get more techniques like the wons you learned in TP. Return to a Majora's Mask style of more personal sidequests. Also, raise the stakes, in BotW the fun came from mastering the world itself, which encourages exploration. Majora's Mask for example totally encouraged exploration, but their was always the fact that the Moon was hanging right there waiting to destroy everything. That's what I want, an atmosphere where your reminded of impending doom. Make the map size smaller to keep things tight, like %50 the map of BotW would be good.

That's my idea for a better story driven Zelda game, but the Zelda team always does what it wants either way, they might think up something completely different than what's happened before. Like a Zelda game where the Link's a career dungeon crawler and the entire land of Hyrule has an economy based off of dungeon crawling or whatever unorthodox world they come up with to justify a new gameplay mechanic.

[Slumber]

I said when BotW was brand new, but I'd LOVE a Majora's Mask to Breath's Ocarina of Time. 

Reuse a lot of the assets and flip everything we saw in that game on its head. Give us a creative, new take on it using already available resources. Maybe touch stuff up a bit and optimize it better for the Switch. 

[Armagon]

I loved Breath of the Wild but i'm hoping the next game could fix a few flaws. Mainly

• The music. I know why BotW went it's music direction, but it was pretty boring traveling the vast world and the only song you'd hear was "wind with a piano key every 30 seconds". I'd want the music to give me the sense of adventure and BotW's overworld theme certainly doesn't do that.
• Quests. Quests in BotW felt like they were added in at the last second. Compared to Majora's Mask, where quests had an actual impact, BotW's quests felt really lackluster. And most of them were vague as fuck. Especially quests that lead to Shrines.
• From a design standpoint, i thought the Divine Beasts were fine. What i didn't like was how they all visually looked the same. A similar issue with the shrines exists.
• The Legend of Rain at Inconvenient Times
• Have some sort of postgame or endgame challenge. Because once you beat Ganon, you lose a lot of motivation to keep playing imo.

[vanguard333]

On ‎2017‎-‎12‎-‎19 at 11:54 AM, TheKingOfTheDragovians said:

What I think they'd need to do. I'd like a more narrative driven game that aids itself to exploration. Weapon durability, I liked it well enough in, but they should go with a method that makes your weapons a little more personal, longer weapon durability, repair options for broken weapons. More playstyles and combat options, quests to get more techniques like the wons you learned in TP. Return to a Majora's Mask style of more personal sidequests. 

I like that idea of making weapons last longer and be capable of being repaired. Perhaps not for broken weapons, but perhaps an option to restore a weapon's durability to full capacity. 

That option to learn more techniques also sounds really good. I understand that the Link in Breath of the Wild was a master swordsman beforehand, but he still had amnesia. It may have been muscle memory, but he still didn't remember all those techniques in his head. 

A few more ideas I just came up with:

1. unique attack animations for certain weapons. For example, a one-handed sword described as "designed for thrusting" will feature thrusting animations rather than cutting. One example of such a weapon could be something like this:

Royal Rapier (design reminiscent of Zelda's sword in Twilight Princess):

A sword designed for the Royal Family for duels, ceremonies, and self-defence. These blades are designed for thrusting rather than cutting, and are often thought to be enchanted. Whether or not it's true, a very old magic seems to linger in this one...

When this sword is equipped, if the wielder presses the button to throw a weapon, instead of the weapon being thrown, a ball of magic energy, similar to the ones used by Ganondorf in the Twilight Princess boss fight, but much smaller, is launched out of the blade. 

For another example, a two-handed weapon "designed to be used by Hylians" will have a greater attack speed than a two-handed weapon, "designed to be used by Ganondorf's monsters" or, "Designed to be used by Gorons". 

Also along these lines, I hope they change the throwing animation for one-handed swords. The current animation for throwing a one-handed weapon is great for boomerangs, but not great for swords. I would prefer if they changed the animation so that he throws the sword straight forward like a spear (which, incidentally, is how one would throw a sword in real life in the Middle Ages).

2. Maybe a Hylian villain. Breath of the Wild came close with the Yiga Clan, who were Shiekah. But, unless you count the times Zelda's body has been possessed by the main villain, there has never been a Hylian villain before. I think it could be really interesting to see an antagonist who is Hylian, especially if the villain's identity as a Hylian is hidden for parts of the game and is revealed as a plot twist. How would Link feel about having to fight a Hylian? What is this character's reason for siding with Ganon? Does he appear to be the main villain only to get hijacked by Ganondorf, or is his servitude made clear from the start?

[Harvey]

This is to be expected. Nothing new here.

For a brand new 3D Mario game on the other hand....

 

[Sentacotus]

It will be awesome BoTW was a great start on where to take the franchise if they can build up from that base and fix some of the flaws with it like having more people to interact with, ability to customize/fix weapons, better dungeons they will really have something special on their hands.  

[vanguard333]

On ‎2018‎-‎01‎-‎07 at 9:16 PM, LordOTaco said:

It will be awesome BoTW was a great start on where to take the franchise if they can build up from that base and fix some of the flaws with it like having more people to interact with, ability to customize/fix weapons, better dungeons they will really have something special on their hands.  

I agree. 

One thing I would definitely like to see: a redesign for the Great Fairies. I would much prefer a design that's more... elegant, refined, mysterious and mystic. I would prefer something closer to what we got in Four Swords, Minish Cap or Wind Waker, and not... what we got in Breath of the Wild.

I suppose the ones in Breath of the Wild are kind of like the ones in OoT and Majora's Mask: giant, wingless women who were... flirtatious (for lack of a better word)... but Breath of the Wild greatly exaggerated this to the point where it was off-putting. I was hoping that the outfit-upgrade cutscene would involve cool magic; not... what actually happened. I didn't even find the cutscenes funny. 

[Interdimensional Observer]

So far I'm liking BotW. I only started a few days ago. Since weapons break and I gain nothing from combat, I've been largely avoiding it. Instead I've been running around trying to find Shrines (and currently in my random exploration, why in Hyrule does northernmost Eldin seem to lack any? Are some invisible? Shrines and Towers being the only warp points is a bad move). Enemy avoidance is super easy the vast majority of the time- I covered 1/3 or so Hyrule's provinces with only 4 hearts- since enemy density is sooo low, only Guardians are a threat most of the time. When I do get into battles, either I sprint and climb away, or I get hit and quickly killed, sometimes one shotted. It was fun trying to find all the Towers though, climbing some of them was real easy, others like the Akkala one and the other covered in that purple black stuff were fun little challenges. The only time I really had to fight my way into a Tower was the one surrounded by water with three Wizzrobes dancing around it, there was no way to get to it without being spotted and put under relentless assault (why no nearby mountains/cliffs?), so I had to use a few Bomb and Flame Arrows to get it done. And I really should've prepped some cold-resistant food for the snowy tower, as is I had to burn through a horde of apples and mushrooms to climb it. I've liked the Shrine puzzles, they're well thought out, but the gyroscope control ones were agony- that Rollgoal inspired one ended with me, after becoming very frustrated and the controls really messed up, noticing that I could turn the board upside down and the ball would roll all over it with no maze hassle. So at that point I just did that and flicked the ball onto the alley to solve the puzzle after a couple more tries.

I still haven't met Impa by the way. I ran to Gerudo Desert in intentional defiance of what the game tells me, and then worked in a counterclockwise manner unlocking all the Towers. I intentionally avoided contact with peaceful intelligent lifeforms along the entire journey. Once I find another Shrine near my current location (I'm nearing the forest in the north where I assume the good old MS is), I want to go back to Eventide, since I failed the survival challenge twice and didn't save on the island during it (stupid me!). I really like the challenge, I just got brainless and tried to fight one of the tougher enemies. I probably didn't need to kill it, but I tried and got butchered by it on my second attempt (the first ended with me caught in a Chuchu explosion), perhaps luring it to a cliff edge and letting a bomb send it plunging off would work. The Hinox- I see it has an Orb I need to complete the trial, but I didn't see any surefire kill method. The attempt to roll the boulders on the nearby hill at it ended with the first boulder missing and the second dealing little damage. I didn't explore the island completely, so maybe there is another method available. 

 

3 hours ago, vanguard333 said:

I suppose the ones in Breath of the Wild are kind of like the ones in OoT and Majora's Mask: giant, wingless women who were... flirtatious (for lack of a better word)... but Breath of the Wild greatly exaggerated this to the point where it was off-putting. I was hoping that the outfit-upgrade cutscene would involve cool magic; not... what actually happened. I didn't even find the cutscenes funny. 

So the thing in the giant plant visible from the Tower in the northwesternmost province was a Great Fairy after all? Between the way they talked, the look of the arm that came out, the ugly plant, and the demand for Rupees, I assumed it was a monster hoax and thus exercised caution and didn't pay.

I wasn't fond of the Great Fairy weapon in HW, since the victory animation looked like Link was being harassed. I get it's a parody of Link constantly bottling fairies, but it went a little too far for me.

 

Can't make a full set of criticisms of BotW yet since I haven't completed the game. But so far I don't like the absence of overworld music as @Armagon points out. The one other open world game I've played, Xenoblade Chronicles X, is much better in this regard (it also is in enemy density). Sure Oblivia's epic sounding day theme may eventually grow into a bother when the thrill wears off, but it still adds life to the game (and that is true of any VG field/battle composition). And Sylvalum has mellow but very atmospheric music too very well suited for the impression given by the landscape. And then of course we have the plain old XC games, which are I guess pseudo-open world in the sense the areas look like it, but the games are more linear than true open world, but have awesome soundtracks (except for the Ether Mines- forget it exists, that and the High Entia Tomb- but at least that is shorter lived). The rain is nasty too. Climbing goes from cake to almost impossible, and sometimes it never stops and or comes at a most inconvenient time (me approaching Akkala Tower). This game might make me rethink my love for the Song of Storms.

 

I get that converting over to an open world format was a radical retooling of the Zelda series. BotW, as the comparison to OoT was made before, isn't wrong in that it invented a new direction for the series, and hence didn't necessarily have the ability to do everything perfectly (OoT Hyrule Field is barebones). The next LoZ should hopefully address the issues at hand and do things beyond our expectations.

Although I wouldn't mind them doing a more traditional game on the side, I loved A Link Between Worlds!

But yeah I kinda abused this topic for me to discuss my BotW experience.

[vanguard333]

3 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

So the thing in the giant plant visible from the Tower in the northwesternmost province was a Great Fairy after all? Between the way they talked, the look of the arm that came out, the ugly plant, and the demand for Rupees, I assumed it was a monster hoax and thus exercised caution and didn't pay.

Yes; it was a Great Fairy. Yeah; it definitely can look like a monster hoax. I kept looking at the guide book I bought and thought, "It says the fairy is right here (for a different fairy location), but all I see is a weird giant thorny plant. What even is that? ...Could it be? ...Oh; it was the Great Fairy fountain the whole time."

7 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

I wasn't fond of the Great Fairy weapon in HW, since the victory animation looked like Link was being harassed. I get it's a parody of Link constantly bottling fairies, but it went a little too far for me.

Well; then you definitely won't like what the Great Fairies do to Link to upgrade his outfits in Breath of the Wild. I mean; the first level of upgrade is probably fine, but the rest go a bit too far...

9 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

But yeah I kinda abused this topic for me to discuss my BotW experience.

It's okay; one reason I created this thread to discuss both the news that work on the next Zelda has begun, and to discuss Breath of the Wild and how the next game can differ/improve. If discussing your BOTW experience enables you to fulfill the latter, then it's perfectly fine. I myself brought up my experience of BOTW and how I missed armoured enemies, to suggest that armoured enemies be included in the next game. Others have brought up their BOTW experience to mention things like the music, the overworld, the quests, the dungeons, etc., and what they feel could/should be done for the next game. I don't see any difference between what you typed and that, other than paragraph length. 

[Armagon]

29 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

The rain is nasty too. Climbing goes from cake to almost impossible, and sometimes it never stops and or comes at a most inconvenient time (me approaching Akkala Tower).

I need to add on to this. The rain is nasty but thunderstorms are just as bad. In the beginning, it doesn't really matter. Most of your equipment is weak, wooden stuff. But come the late-game, your equipment will mostly be metal. Which means that it'll attract lightning. This is particularly troublesome in the Akkala region, as i've noticed Akkala has more thunderstorms than other regions. Too many times i've found myself fighting a Lynel or a Hinox only for a thunderstorm to roll in and, because all of my equipment is metal, i have to unequip everything to avoid being struck by lightning and run away. This doesn't apply to metal armor but it applies to everything else.

32 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

I want to go back to Eventide, since I failed the survival challenge twice and didn't save on the island during it (stupid me!). I really like the challenge, I just got brainless and tried to fight one of the tougher enemies. I probably didn't need to kill it, but I tried and got butchered by it on my second attempt (the first ended with me caught in a Chuchu explosion), perhaps luring it to a cliff edge and letting a bomb send it plunging off would work. The Hinox- I see it has an Orb I need to complete the trial, but I didn't see any surefire kill method. The attempt to roll the boulders on the nearby hill at it ended with the first boulder missing and the second dealing little damage. I didn't explore the island completely, so maybe there is another method available. 

Eventide is much easier if you've completed all four Divine Beasts.

There also is an exploit you can do if you want to do it earlier. When approaching Eventide Island on a raft, drop any equipment you want to use on the raft and land on the island. The trial starts, your equipment gets taken away....but anything you dropped on the raft will still be there. The downside is that you'll lose these upon completing the trial.

There's an Orb atop the big mountain on the island (technically, the layer right below the top). That's where one of the goals are as well. Make sure that orb goes there. If you use that particular orb on any of the other two goals, then you basically just fucked yourself from completing the trial and have to do it all over again. Because there's no way to get an Orb up the mountain.